The unfortunate heron

So the flamingo was lonely in her menagerie and asked if maybe I could stitch a bird-like companion. Since I needed a project for the Stitch N Pitch game, I readily agreed to stitch Aury's heron, if I could find fabric and floss. I had a whole batch of Vikki's pretty D-bag skeins to choose from. Y'know I was tired of stitching the same colors, so I stayed away from my usual crimson/red/scarlet variations. I instead picked out a lovely shade of orange. I only finished about half of the project at the game. The biggest irony was looking at my color choice -- I'm a Washington Nationals fan and we were playing the Baltimore Orioles, so there I was at Nats Park in my red W cap stitching an orange bird at our home game. And yes, the Orioles wound up winning 2-1. Irony thy name is...

Stitch N Pitch 2009

I managed a few photos of Nationals Park, but none of the Stitch N Pitch event. They’re up on my Flickr account, if you’re interested. I'll add photos of the hat & my project later.

I attended my second Stitch N Pitch event last night. The Washington Nationals were hosting Baltimore Orioles in the second game of the vaunted “Battle of the Beltway”. The sad truth is both teams are hanging out in their respective division’s basements, so it was a fair match-up, but a frustrating one. There were a lot of Orioles fans in attendance, as evidenced by the ones shouting the traditional “Ohhhh” during the national anthem. At times, I felt like I was the visitor and not at a home game. That made it difficult to really enjoy the game like last year.

The Metro trip to the ballpark was still relatively quick and uneventful. The construction is still in progress around the Nationals Park and I unfortunately get the sense that it’s at a standstill.

One surprise once you’d entered the stadium – if you were one of the first 20,000 fans, you received a free hat! I’d forgotten all about the promotion. Even adjustable, the hat was way too big for me. I could have easily fit my other cap over it without any trouble.

The Stitch N Pitch event was again in one of the conference rooms. I’d grabbed a flyer from Needlewoman East when I was at last at the store. I hadn’t known where to go last year so I spent time hunting around.

This year was definitely smaller and more low-key. Sara Leigh Merrey of Scarlet Thread was gamely demonstrating needlepoint, even showed me to do a simple tent stitch on a “W” pattern. Tent stitch I learned was all about the intersections, which took some getting used to. I think she had intended to demonstrate counted work, but they’d changed things around. I showed off the Book of Ink Circles one last night. That conference captured a lot of sunlight, so it was perfect to see how my colors really looked.

There were other tables for cross stitch, knitting and crochet. There were no goodie bags this year. You could buy an eco-friendly bag for $5. Knitters and crocheters had the option of creating a square for charity. I wish they’d had an option like that for the needleworkers. I do still feel like the knitters/crocheters had a stronger community than the needleworkers.

Most of the knitters in my section knew each other by name. By contrast, I knew only one or two of the people from Scarlet Thread.

Unlike last year, they also had vendor tables for a couple of local designers and a couple of the shops, including some beautiful Quaker patterns. The crowd was definitely smaller this time around. Of course I showed up fairly early when the gates opened. They did schedule it for the Saturday of a major holiday weekend, so that worked against it too.

Afterwards I headed upstairs to find food & drink and my seat. They’d removed the pretzels from the place I’d gone to last year, so I made do with an order of French Fries and water. Water seemed like the smart play, since the soda had made me so thirsty, but it was struggle. Alas the drink vendor who came through our section only had beer and water.

I was seated in section 302, only a section away from where we sat last time around. They’re still great seats of the third base side and left field. You can’t miss the massive scoreboard giving you all the balls and strikes, useful when you need to look up and reorient yourself.

I had knitters on one side of me, although Donna LaBranche, who taught my baseball biscornu class, turned out to be seated only a few seats away on one side. And on the other, I had another family of which the daughter/wife was steadily needleworking away. I was a little worried when the older man broke out the bag of peanuts. I’m not allergic, but the smell does have a tendency to make me nauseous a little.

Ross Detwiler pitched extremely well, even getting himself out of a bases loaded jam in the third inning. Young Justin Maxwell performed highway robbery of the best kind in center field by snatching a ball before it went over the stands for a home run for Adam Jones. Great catch and apparently made the ESPN highlights and well deserved. Unfortunately Maxwell miscalculated a later hit that allowed the Orioles to score, so he still has a lot to learn. Christian Guzman had a gorgeous home run. But it still wasn’t enough. The Nationals eventually lost 2-1. The Nationals just weren’t capitalizing on our chances, compared to the Orioles. But it was nice to see both Nick Johnson and Ryan Zimmerman playing in person. They were both injured by the time I saw the team last year.

I did get quite a bit of cross stitch done on an Aury menagerie freebie of a heron. A gorgeous bird flew over the stadium during one of the late innings. My seatmate suggested it might be heron and maybe I was a good omen. I didn’t have the chance to point out the critical mistake I’d made in choosing my colors for that project. I was tired of shades of red, so I’d picked this lovely pretty color in my d-bag flosses from Vikki Clayton. There was just one problem: the floss was orange. Yes, I was a Nationals fan stitching an orange bird. The irony was not lost on me.

Speaking of That Bird, he made an appearance during the President’s Race to trip up Teddy from sprinting to victory. I cried “Foul!” as it were. I’m sure the Orioles fans were pleased. They were quite vocal in their support, especially when they introduced Redskins players’ Mike Sellers & Antwaan Randle-El. (As I quipped, Randle-El could do dear damn near everything they threw at him, so maybe they should try baseball! It might have helped.)

After the game, I hiked down Half Street back to the Navy Yard to find a Metro train to L’Enfant and then home. I actually have very few complaints about getting to the Park or back home, compared to some DC events.

All in all it was a good game, but I think it’d be improved by going to the game with a few friends. Also I hope that next year Nationals have a better team and a different opponent.

Book of Ink Circles updated finally!

I've been slowly getting back into working on my Book of Ink Circles project. I ran out of several major colors, which slowed me down. After reordering from Vikki Clayton, I've been slowly getting parts done during the hockey playoffs. I'm still not wild about either shades of blue, especially the lighter one.

Uncertain what to do next, I asked the designer. Tracy Horner offered some color suggestions. One idea was to swap the blues, making Magpie Warbles the dominant color in this corner and using my purple as a shadow. The end result created an interesting z effect with the center cross because of the way Mahogany variegated. I found I liked the old Ultra Maroon I still had left over. (I don't know if it's the new floss or a dyelot issue, but all of my colors are a lot lighter than before. Serves me right for not buying enough at the time.)

"The flamingo is ridiculous looking bird."

So it's been awhile since I've posted here. Time just has a way of getting away from you, doesn't it?

Quite a lot has changed since that last update. My old haunt, Needlewoman East, has shifted almost entirely towards needlepoint. They still carry a good selection of specialty threads, but from a cross stitch charts and fabric perspective, I'll have to look elsewhere. Scarlet Thread moved from Vienna to Great Falls and sadly will be closing next month. There a few stores left in the Northern Virginia area, but not a lot of them are public transportation friendly.

The latest scan is a Quaker-inspired flamingo created by Aury. She publishes some lovely freebies of different animals and they're very easy to stitch up. The blog is bilingual in Spanish and English. For threads, I used a Vikki Clayton mystery spool. When I saw the color initially, I couldn't imagine what I'd use it for. I tend towards more muted colors. But this color seemed perfect for this particular bird of paradise. West Wing fan that I am, she's nicknamed "Claudia Jane".

Hope to post some of the older updates, including my Olympic stitching, my first needlework class, Stitch N Pitch and continuing trials of the Book of Ink Circles. I'm back-dating those posts and marking them "flashback" in the tags, so readers can find them easily. I tried doing them as new posts, but that was going to get confusing fast.

Stitching Olympics 2008

The cross_stitch group on livejournal hosted an "Stitching Olympics" for the 2008 Summer Olympics. Stitching entrants set goals for themselves at various gold/silver/bronze level for different types of projects. Stitchers could challenge themselves to finish a pesky WIP or a page or two from a BAP or stitch a bunch of smalls, whatever combination you could come up with. If you finished before closing ceremonies, you win!

I signed up with three projects, one WIP and two brand new projects. I didn't make much progress with the Fox tote bag WIP or Aury's Mini Quaker, but I did manage a Silver medal for completing Ink Circles' Quackworth 2007.

Quackworth 2007 stitched up unbelievably fast. I started it the first night of the Olympics and finished it during the women's marathon only a week later. I was surprised as anyone. It wound up feeling more like a middle distance race than a marathon, but I wasn't complaining.

The fabric is a 32 ct cream Belfast linen stitched with Vikki Clayton's HDF Bitterness.



Here is my silver medal. To quote Michelle Kwan, "silver's not so bad.")

We make our own fun

So I finished the latest two parts of Book of Ink Circles. When you're doing a long term project, I've discovered you learn to make your own fun. I doubt it's entirely a coincidence. All of the "Dutch Beast" motifs had hidden in-jokes/meanings, so why should this Mystery be any different?

For this corner section, I think Buffy the Vampire Slayer's Anya has reason to be afraid... very very afraid.



Maybe they're to chase the frogs away? Or keep the cats company? Or look furry and menacing? Cause they're not just cute like everyone supposes.

For the next section, maybe it was because of July 4th, but I kept quoting certain lines from the musical "1776". See if you agree:



FRANKLIN: The turkey!
ADAMS: The eagle!

So I figure the bird can be either done in browns/oranges for Thanksgiving or in patriotic fervor for the 4th. Your pick.

Stitch N Pitch 2008

After changing into my Scarlet Thread t-shirt and my Nationals W cap, I went straight over to Nationals Park after work. The Metro ride to the game was pain-free. I was going against the usual commuter traffic back into DC, changing at L'Enfant Plaza and two stops to Navy Yard. And then what has become a tradition -- walking down Half Street towards the stadium. And yes, don't let them fool you. While there construction going up around the stadium, it is in a rather miserable neighborhood. But there's plenty of security types around. Even after the game after midnight, I felt perfectly safe.

The new Nationals Park is gorgeous! They really outdid themselves on that front. I wandered through the team store, but I already had my prized curly W hat. I did buy a program. Ironically the freebie program had Elijah Dukes on the cover.

The one flaw in the Stitch N Pitch organization was I didn't know where they were meeting. They'd included little notices at the seats, but I hadn't found my section yet! I'd watched a video from last year's event where they met on one of the concourses. That was last year, when the Nats still lived at RFK. In trying to find the ramp to up to my level, I found the conference rooms and our location!

There were representatives from most of the local shops, including a couple of familiar faces from both Scarlet Thread and Needlewoman East. The first 400 people received a red curly W goodie bag with patterns, fiber, even a pair of Bates number 8 knitting needles. Tables were demonstrating or teaching the different arts. The knitting table was particularly popular, especially with the younger crowd. The lady from Needlewoman East showed off needlepoint and the owner of Scarlet Thread worked on her cross stitch on a table stand. The MASN tv camera popped in for a short time to allow their sideline reporter Debbie Taylor to interview someone about the event. I'll have to check the DVR to see if we made it to the pregame show. I taped the game, but I was assuming it was a normal nine inning game too. Oops.

I showed off the Book of Ink Circles. We were still in last batch of sunlight and the sun caught it directly and all the colors gleamed. I was momentarily surprised. My home lighting really doesn't do it justice.

Then I wandered up stairs to find food and drink and my seat. I did not find a Curly W Pretzel. They were all the way back downstairs and I wasn't in the mood for a hike, so I went with the local little stand. I made do with a boring pretzel, hot dog and drink. In retrospect, I should have gone with water. The one annoying thing: no lids. I know they don't want people throwing things onto the field, but really, I wish there was a practical way to allow them. Do you know how hard it is to carry all this stuff and not spill something? Especially with all the stairs you have to navigate, it's like they're asking for trouble!

I was seated in section 303, which is one of the upper levels opposite left field. I had a perfect view of the massive scoreboard, which came in handy for keeping up with the balls and strikes. It really did look like it was hard to find a bad seat in the house. You could see the entire field. If you want the view of the Capitol dome, though, I think you want right field side. The MASN booth is way way up there behind home plate. Someone would really have to be trying to hit a foul ball up there.

I was seated between a knitter on one side and a set of quilters on the other. They all worked in a quilting shop in Great Falls, Virginia and apparently there's a Veterans Day swap/event among the local stores so they were sewing squares. They needed to do eleven and I think they'd nearly finished four by the time they'd left. Some people were bigger baseball fans than others.

I do wish the regular attendance was better. For all the hype of a new stadium, there were still a lot of empty seats and even more as the long night wore on. There were going to be some disappointed fans, too. They were promised Friday night fireworks, but the game ended so late, they had to cancel them, out of respect for their neighbors. They had to do that once before with the Cubs game that Nieves hit a walk-off home run to end.

Oh, yes, there was a game! The first Stitch N Pitch had a near no-hitter, so this one more lived up to its former hype. It was a little disconcerting not to have the replays and Sutton/Carpenter commentary. For stitching purposes, it usually means I don't miss things, but last night I missed a few key plays, including Rangers catcher Gerard Laird injuring his hamstring running out a single. Tim Redding had one bad inning that scored three Rangers. The Nationals kept chipping away at that lead with base runners here and there. With eleven hits, they had no trouble getting people on base, it was converting those opportunities! Elijah Dukes was a one man wrecking crew. He was on base almost every time he went up. He hit both the home run that tied the game and the go-ahead winning single in the 14th. Not a bad way to earn your game check.

The night was a long one. And lord knows they tried to keep things interesting. They wound up running two President's Race. Teddy didn't do very well in either. Poor Teddy. We had both a 7th inning and a 14th inning stretch. I joked that it had been another 7 innings, after all, much to the amusement of the man behind me. We both quoted "Bull Durham" when the Rangers had a meeting at the mound ("Candlesticks always make a nice gift. And, maybe you can find out where she's registered...") You make your own fun by the 14th inning, okay?

There was also a lovely moment of tribute on the the big scoreboard to Tim Russert in between innings. They showed a video backed to Bruce Springsteen song with clips of Russert talking about baseball being back in Washington. It ended with "You'll always be our 10th man".

The quilters and I had a good time with the theme songs. Apparently every Nationals player has an at-bat theme song clips, featuring a lot of hard rock/rap/Latin music from what I could determine. We were trying to figure out what our themes would be, prompting some silly responses. One lady was a big country fan so somehow we went from "Tequila Makes Her Clothes Fall Off" to "Beer for my Horses". I wasn't snappy enough to come up with "Margaritaville". Sadly I would have gone with some classic hard rock -- "Back in Black" or "Walk this Way" or even "Enter the Sandman". (I know they've got a list of the songs on the MLB site. I stumbled onto it by accident once.)

When the game was finally over and the Nationals won, leaving most fans happy (not all -- they were quite a few Rangers fans at the game), a large number of us trudged down Half Street to Navy Yard. Say what I will about WMATA and I can say plenty, they managed the crush very well. They held one train to allow people to get downstairs and then brought in a completely empty train to cover nearly everyone else. Two stops and then go downstairs at L'Enfant to head for home.

It was quite an experience for only my second MLB game. I had great fun going to the game and meeting all the stitchers, but I would not want to do that on a regular basis. Certainly not 14 innnings worth!

I did manage to take a few photos which are on my Flickr account. They include pictures of the goodie bag and the stadium and neighborhood.

Articles on the Game
Washington Post article
Washington Times